An Indigenous Social Desirability Scale

Abstract

We describe an Indigenous Social Desirability Scale for Mexico developed using a mixed-methods approach. Scores on the scale with two dimensions show adequate reliability and validity.

Keywords

socially desirable responding impression management indigenous measure

Socially desirable responding (SDR) is generally defined as a tendency to give positive self-descriptions (Paulhus, 2002) and is usually measured by either of two well-known Western scales: The Marlowe–Crowne Social Desirability (Crowne & Marlowe, 1960) and the Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding (Paulhus, 1998b). People from Latin American countries show relatively high scores on such Western scales (e.g., Ross & Mirowsky, 1984), possibly because of the limited applicability of the items among Latin American people. These findings suggest that the concept of SDR also applies to countries such as Mexico where the present study is conducted; yet there is no work on the meaning and assessment of SDR in Mexico (Domínguez-Espinosa, Salas Menotti, & Reyes Lagunes, 2008). We think that indigenous work can enhance our understanding of SDR in Mexico. Therefore, we set out to develop an indigenous measure of SDR using qualitative and quantitative techniques in the Mexican context. Adopting a mixed-methods approach, we present three studies, in which we used a qualitative approach for item development, followed by two quantitative studies that addressed the validity of scores on the instrument.

The Concept of Socially Desirable Responding

Originally, SDR was conceived of as a response set tendency (Cronbach, 1946; Edwards, 1957; Paulhus, 2002), aimed at revealing oneself in a more positive or socially approved manner and as a temporary reaction to a situational demand such as time pressure or expected public disclosure of answers (Mick, 1996). SDR measures have been used widely to correct for tendencies to present a distorted self-image, usually overly and unrealistically positive self-presentations (Paulhus, 2002). However, correcting for distortions as measured by SDR scales has turned out to be contentious; for example, Borkenau and Ostendorf (1992) demonstrated that self- and other-ratings on SDR measures are similar across different situations, thereby questioning the idea of SDR as only involving impression management. Also, the popular view that SDR creates spurious relationships between personality measures and other measures (e.g., job outcomes) has been shown to be invalid in different meta-analyses (Li & Bagger, 2006; Ones, Viswesvaran, & Reiss, 1996). Finally, there is evidence for the view that SDR is a trait-like characteristic related to ego strength (Sammon, Reznikoff, & Geisinger, 1985), tender-mindedness, and composure (Watson, Morris, Foster, & Hood, 1986), and that SDR is an adaptive trait that promotes high self-esteem, positive first impressions, and sense of competence (Paulhus, 1991, 1998a, 2002; Paulhus & John, 1998).

According to Millham (1974) and Ramanaiah, Schill, and Leung (1977), SDR is composed of two separate components, one refers to an attribution motivation which reflects the tendency to attribute socially desirable characteristics to oneself; the other refers to a denial motivation, which reflects the tendency to deny undesirable characteristics. Paulhus (1984, 2002) also stated that SDR has two components, namely self-deception and impression management. Self-deception is a propensity to unintentionally portray oneself in a favorable light, manifested in positively biased but honestly believed self-descriptions. Impression management, in contrast, indicates a tendency to intentionally distort one’s self-image to be perceived favorably by others. According to Paulhus (1998b, 2002; Paulhus & John, 1998), these distinctions involve two types of motivations: Impression management is based on approval seeking, and self-deception on power seeking. In the first one, a person fears social disapproval, attempts to live in harmony with others, denies common faults, and wants to appear like a saint following societal rules. In the second, a person overestimates his or her qualities and strives to give the impression of being a superhero (Paulhus & John, 1998).

The Need for a New SDR Scale

The classical scale to assess SDR is the Marlowe–Crowne Social Desirability Scale (Crowne & Marlowe, 1960), which measures SDR by asking for the endorsement of socially approved and disapproved behaviors. The scale was developed on the basis of personality items from different inventories published in the late 1950s. Various critical issues were raised since its publication as its dimensionality is not clear (Ballard, 1992; Holden & Fekken, 1989; Loo & Thorpe, 2000), some of its content is out of date (Stöber, 1999), validity studies mainly involved only student samples (Larsen, Martin, Ettinger, & Nelson, 1976), and some of the items had no discriminatory power or revealed irrelevant content when adapted to other cultures (Collazo, 2005; Gove & Geerken, 1977; Lück & Timaeus, 1969; Ribas, Moura, & Hutz, 2004; Stöber, 1999). As a result, it is difficult to separate real cross-cultural differences from those differences that arise as a consequence of cultural bias in the measure (Dudley, McFarland, Goodman, Hunt, & Sydell, 2005).

The Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding (BIDR; Paulhus, 1998b) was developed to overcome some of the problems of the Marlowe–Crowne Scale. It was developed on the basis of different Western scales and validated in Canadian student samples. Even though the BIDR was well received in the scientific community, it is not without problems. Callaway (2009) found in a study of Canadian students that neither the BIDR nor the Marlowe–Crowne revealed their expected structure. Similar problems could arise even more when used in non-Western populations.

SDR and Culture

Schwartz (2011) indicated that the social desirability of particular needs, traits, and values can vary across cultures; similarly, Marín, Triandis, Kashima, and Betancourt (1983) argued that the perceived desirability of SDR items can vary across languages and cultures. So, items linked to cultural settings and the cross-cultural applications of scales should address the suitability of items in specific cultural contexts (van de Vijver & Leung, 2000). In short, the universal and culture-specific components of current Western conceptualizations and instruments of SDR are unknown. As shown in the next section, applications of common scales of SDR in Spanish-speaking populations usually do not address the validity of scores on these instruments.

SDR in Latin America

Based on Western measures, Latin American individuals tend to score higher on SDR measures than many other ethnic groups. Ross and Mirowsky (1984) showed that European Americans scored lower on SDR than Mexican and Mexican Americans on a short form of the Marlowe–Crowne Scale. Shultz and Chávez (1994), using language as a proxy for ethnicity, found that job applicants from Latin America scored higher than European Americans on an SDR scale similar to the Marlowe–Crowne Scale. Booth-Kewley (1992) found that Hispanic navy recruits scored higher than White, non-Hispanic recruits on the impression management dimension, but no differences were observed in the self-deception dimension from the BIDR. Miller et al. (2000) also found a significant effect of ethnicity on BIDR subscales but in the opposite direction; no effects were observed on impression management, whereas a significant difference was found for self-deception, with Latin and African American females scoring higher than European Americans. Dudley et al. (2005) also found that Hispanic job applicants obtained higher scores than Whites on a BIDR-like measure.

SDR is a reflection of a personality trait that is related to the need for approval (Crowne & Marlowe, 1964), which predisposes the individual to agree or conform to social norms in pursuit of harmonious social relations. As these norms have a strong cultural component, it is important to take cultural elements into account when constructing a scale (Domínguez-Espinosa et al., 2008; Stöber, 2001).

The aim of the present research was to construct an indigenous scale to measure SDR in a combined emic–etic approach (see Cheung, van de Vijver, & Leong, 2011) in which indigenous (emic) content reflected traits and values salient for Latin American (Mexican) population while carefully examining the link between the culture-specific content to the hypothesized universal (etic) dimensions of SDR. The combined emic–etic approach provided the opportunity to compare an indigenously derived measure of imported concepts with a consistent theoretical background to identify SDR trait characteristics that are either universal or more specific to a given (cultural) group.

Study 1

The aim of the study was to identify suitable content to construct an SDR item pool, using two different qualitative approaches: (a) the identification of the social representation of desirable and undesirable behavior and (2) the test of overlapping content with other SDR measures.

Method

Participants

A first convenience nonprobabilistic sample was used to identify the implicit models of desirable and undesirable behaviors. A total of 829 Mexicans of the general population from Michoacán (25%), Leon (25%), and Mexico City (50%) participated, 412 men and 417 women, aged 18 to 50 years (Mdn_age = 28 years). The sample was heterogeneous in some background variables, such as socioeconomic status, of which 80% with tertiary level of education. These cities were chosen in a combination to reach a good coverage of the population while still working in areas that were easily accessible.

Procedure

We used the Natural Semantic Network Technique (NSNT; Reyes-Lagunes, 1993; Valdez Medina, 1996) to identify the social representation of SDR. This technique is based on semantic meaning activation (Collins & Loftus, 1975; Figueroa, Gonzalez, & Solis, 1981). This technique maps information in memory of specific stimuli—in this case, desirable–undesirable behaviors—that would reflect their shared subjective meaning within a group (Reyes-Lagunes, 1993; Valdez Medina, 1996).

Participants were asked to write down 5 to 10 separate words that would best define the stimulus shown. The stimulus card read (in Spanish): “1) Desirable behaviors and 2) Undesirable behaviors.” Participants then were asked to add a number to each word they generated that would mark the word’s importance in relation to the stimulus, with number one, the closest one to the original stimulus, number two the next one, and so forth. Each word then gets a specific weight (the first word has a score of 10, the second has a score of 9, etc.), and is multiplied by the word’s frequency; the final scores represent a global importance score of each word. The result obtained is named the Semantic Weight [SW; Peso Semántico in Spanish]. A high SW implies that the word is closer to the core meaning—hence more consequential—to the concept under study. Before computing the SW, plural nouns were transformed to their singular form and feminine words to their masculine form (e.g., Trabajador [worker masculine]—Trabajadora [worker feminine]). Synonymous words were gathered in a single-word category. The overview of the ranked stimulus words is called the semantic network of the concept.

Participation was anonymous and voluntary; no monetary compensation was offered. The instrument was administered in public places, such as parks, stadiums, schools, offices, and shopping centers. The total time to complete the task was 3 minutes on average.

After processing all stimuli, the 15 words with the highest SW were compared with the content of the BIDR and to the Marlowe–Crowne Scale to check for overlaps by two judges (two PhD students) who rated the overlap independently of each other. The two raters evaluated the presence of 30 concepts (15 desirable and 15 undesirable) in 73 items, thereby making a total of 2,190 ratings. An initial interrater agreement of 90% was obtained and the remaining disagreements were resolved through discussion.

Instruments

Each stimulus was presented to the participant separately and in random order, printed top-centered on white paper sheets. An additional sheet was used to collect sociodemographic data.

Results

A total of 3,087 and 3,105 separate words were generated to define desirable and undesirable characteristics, respectively. When comparing the two semantic networks, it was clear that traits and behaviors that are desirable (e.g., kindness, tolerance, responsibility, sincerity, and loyalty) and undesirable (e.g., laziness, irresponsibility, selfishness, and lying) largely do not mirror each other, supporting the idea that it is necessary to ask for both in order to have both poles in items, as typically done in scales of SDR. The semantic networks were then compared with the items of the BIDR and the Marlowe–Crowne scales to check for similarities and differences in content. This comparison showed that important content for defining both desirability and undesirability found in our sample (e.g., kindness, upbringing of a person, sincerity, loyalty, corruption, violence, alcoholism, drug addiction, and apathy) is not covered by the two Western scales. These findings underscore the need to develop an indigenous measure of SDR that overcomes problems of limited cultural appropriateness of imported measures.

Discussion

The use of a qualitative technique such as NSNT provided us with a wide range of examples of desirable and undesirable behaviors in a Mexican context. The content obtained reflects some of the dichotomous nature of the construct when two different networks emerged, one for desirable behaviors and another for those undesirable ones.

The qualitative information, obtained by means of the NSNT technique, showed that some content of SDR resembles previous findings about personality and values in Mexico (Díaz-Guerrero, 2003; Díaz-Loving, Reyes-Lagunes, & Rivera-Aragón, 2002). We argue that high scores on SDR measures and related personality and value domains can be related to a cultural script that is relevant in Latin America, named Simpatía. According to Triandis, Marín, Lisansky, and Betancourt (1984), a person shows simpatía when he or she is perceived as likable, attractive, fun to be with, easygoing, conformist, capable to share other’s feelings, trustworthy, and avoiding interpersonal conflict. Simpatía emphasizes a display of personal charm, graciousness, hospitality (Sanchez-Burks, Nisbett, & Ybarra, 2000), and maintenance of harmonious and smooth interactions (Holloway, Waldrip, & Ickes, 2009).

The desirability of showing simpatía probably affects the likelihood of endorsing SDR items in Mexican and presumably other Latin American cultures. Some other personality characteristics and values associated with Latin American people, Mexicans in particular, involve showing respect to others and obedience (Díaz-Guerrero, 1977, 1993, 2003; Garcia, Gudykunst, Ting-Toomey, & Nishida, 1996). Being friendly, loyal, honorable, obedient, respectful, sociable, honest, and decent are salient components of the Mexican self-concept (Díaz-Loving et al., 2002; La Rosa & Díaz-Loving, 1991). According to Ortiz et al. (2007), affection, honesty-humility, and warmth are different from the five-factor model of personality for Mexican participants. Also, a self-modifying tendency and caring for the needs of others are salient characteristics of the Mexican personality profile (Díaz-Loving & Draguns, 1999). Finally, the elicited nouns and adjectives of respect, solidarity, loyalty, and being disrespectful and rude can be related to the simpatía script of the Latinos and Mexicans (Garcia et al., 1996; Triandis et al., 1984).

Study 2

The aim of the study was to develop a preliminary version of an indigenous measure of SDR, based on the findings of the previous study and using a group of experts and standard psychometric analysis (reliability index and exploratory factor analysis).

Method

Participants

A nonprobabilistic sample of 404 participants (252 men, 152 women) was recruited from the general population in Mexico City; their age ranged from 17 to 78 years (Mdn_age = 26 years). The sample was heterogeneous in terms of socioeconomic status; 75% had a tertiary level of education.

Instrument and Procedure

Based on the data obtained in the first, qualitative study, we developed an initial pool of 150 items, five per isolated word from the NSNT of desirable and undesirable characteristics, representing common approved and disapproved behaviors in Mexican culture, in accordance with the operational definition of SDR proposed by Crowne and Marlowe (1960). The items used simple formulations and avoided specificity that would make the content relevant for only particular groups or relevant for only one gender. Negative attributes were represented in 55% of the items.

The complete set of 150 items was first checked by a group of six judges (three academics and three master’s and PhD students), who individually rated each item in terms of (a) simplicity, (b) understandability, and (c) accuracy in accordance to the definition of SDR using a 10-point scale. They also rated the expected endorsement rate and the direction of the item vis-à-vis social desirability. The judges eliminated 58 items, mainly due to lack of agreement with the previously established operational definition so that eventually 92 items remained. We used a Likert-type format for the response scale with five anchor options, ranking from strongly disagree (1) to strongly agree (5).

The instruments were applied individually and in group sessions in public places. The participants answered the scales anonymously and voluntarily; no monetary compensation was offered. The approximate duration to complete the scale was 30 minutes.

Results

Sixteen items were deleted as they had item–total correlations with absolute values smaller than .20 and two were deleted because of extreme skewness. We ran a principal component analysis with the remaining 76 items, using a varimax rotation. The Bartlett’s test of sphericity was significant (10764.241, df = 2850, p < .001) and the Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin measure of sampling adequacy was adequate (.867). The scree plot suggested the extraction of four factors, with eigenvalues of 14.03, 8.0, 3.6, and 2.5 respectively, accounting for 28.30% of the total variance. To determine whether an item loaded sufficiently on a particular factor, a lower threshold of .50 on the primary factor loading was used. Such a high value was used to enable further item selection, because we wanted our new measure to be short (to be practically useful). The communalities of the items were high, with a range from .43 to .82. Applying this criterion yielded a total of 28 remaining items; examples of items with the higher loading in the first factor are “I would steal if no one caught me” (.81) and “I lie when it benefits me” (.75); examples of items for the second factor are “I respect people without caring about their way of thinking” (.65) and “I respect people without caring about their social condition” (.60); and examples of items loading on the third factor are “I forget other people’s mistakes even if they hurt me very much” (.76) and “I easily forgive those who offend me” (.73). These 28 items were again factor analyzed revealing two (higher level) factors of positive and negative aspects of SDR; an example of the positive aspects is “I forget other people’s faults, even if they hurt me very much.” An example of the negative aspect is “I have spoken ill of my friends without them knowing about it.” We labeled these two factors as positive and negative aspects of desirability, respectively. The positive items represent value orientations embedded in the simpatía script that reflects behavioral intentions to the maintenance of harmonious and smooth interactions among Latinos. Negative items refer to lying and other undesirable characteristics.

Discussion

Couched in terms of Paulhus’s (2002) theoretical bimodel of SDR, the factors resemble the superhero and saint dichotomy, as well as the dual motivation of self-enhancement and self-protection (Hepper, Gramzow, & Sedikides, 2010), or attribution and denial of positive and negative aspect (Ramanaiah & Martin, 1980), where the first focuses on attaining, maximizing, and regulating positive self-views, and the second focuses on avoiding, minimizing, and repairing negative self-views. Hence, our derived factors give support to the proposed bidimensional model of SDR. This dichotomy is also in line with some previous reports on the nature of SDR dimensionality (Millham, 1974; Paulhus, 2002; Paulhus & John, 1998; Ramanaiah et al., 1977). A further examination was conducted to address the psychometric properties and validity of scores on our instrument.

Study 3

The aim of the study was to provide further evidence for the validity of scores on the indigenous scale by examining its concurrent and convergent validity using a well-known Western measure of SDR and a personality inventory. In addition to student participants, we included two different samples from theoretically distinct populations that, according to the literature, should show different patterns when endorsing SDR scales: religious individuals and inmates. The comparison between these three different samples gives us the opportunity to detect different patterns of endorsing SDR items, thereby making it possible to compare our results with previous findings.

Religious Population

Intrinsically religious people tend to seek social approval and try to look good in the eyes of society; they tend to conform to normative belief systems and present themselves as tolerant, unprejudiced, righteous, and compassionate (Burris & Navara, 2002; Francis, Lewis, & Ng, 2003; Leak & Fish, 1989; Watson et al., 1986). Although not all studies reported a significant correlation between SDR and religiousness (Duck & Hunsberger, 1999; Watson et al., 1986), various studies found that participants from religious schools or groups score higher in SDR than nonreligious people (Crandall & Gozali, 1969; Ellis & Smith, 1991; Leak & Fish, 1989). In a meta-analysis of SDR and religious orientation, Trimble (1997) found that the correlation with the Marlowe–Crowne Scale ranged from .07 to .36, with the Lie Scale from .03 to .23, while the BIDR showed a correlation of .30; these correlations suggest that religious orientation is associated with SDR.

A possible explanation of the association between religiosity and SDR is that some of the items can be interpreted differently or are more endorsed by people with strong religious orientations. Watson et al. (1986) found that at least 12 items from the Marlowe–Crowne Scale refer to religious values (e.g., “I never hesitate to go out of my way to help someone in trouble,” “I would never think of letting someone else be punished for my wrongdoing,” and “I always try to practice what I preach”). So, religious affiliates may score high on a scale of SDR by endorsing items that are consistent with their normative belief system. Also, five items from the MMPI Lie Scale, a measure of SDR, were endorsed more frequently by Christians than non-Christians (Duris, Bjorck, & Gorsuch, 2007).

Incarcerated Population

Prisoners can provide self-favorable descriptions when they are instructed to fake good in psychological tests (LoBello & Sims, 1993; Sackett & Lievens, 2008). They tend to score higher on SDR than normative groups (Fisher & Parsons, 1962; Slaton, Kern, & Curlette, 2000; Stuckless, Ford, & Vitelli, 1995). Sackett and Harris (1984) found that inmates scored more in the negative ranges of various integrity tests when compared with job applicants.

Inmates tend to score higher in psychoticism, neuroticism, and sensation-seeking scales when compared with the general population (Haapasalo, 1990). These results are in line with the idea that psychoticism describes antisocial and criminal tendencies (Hare, 1982); however, lie scores are not consistently correlated with psychoticism (Gossop & Eysenck, 1983).

The reasons for the high scores of inmates on SDR are not clear and differences between different types of crimes have been found (e.g., different types of sexual assault, Kalichman, 1990). Nevertheless, higher SDR scores can be expected among an inmate population.

Method

Participants

The first sample consisted of 583 university students, attending public and private universities in Mexico City (267 men, 315 women, 1 missing data). Their age varied from 18 to 26 years (Mdn_age = 20, 2 missing data); 73% declared to be Catholic.

The second sample comprised 192 Catholic religious peoples, living in convents and monasteries in Mexico City; 64 men (seminarians, monks, and fathers) and 128 women (novices and sisters). Their age varied from 18 to 69 years (Mdn_age = 32, 1 missing); 50% had secondary and 50% tertiary level of education.

The third sample included 452 male inmates (sentenced and convicted) in one of the five penitentiaries in Mexico City. Their age ranged from 18 to 72 years (Mdn_age = 34, 6 missing); 18% had primary, 74% secondary, and 6% tertiary level of education (4 missing); 73% declared to be Catholic.

Instruments

The battery included three scales, administered in the following order: (a) The Indigenous Social Desirability Scale (hereafter called ISDS) with 28 items; (b) The NEO-FFI (Costa & McCrae, 1999), which consisted in 60 items, divided in five dimensions of 12 items: Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness, Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness; and (c) Marlowe–Crowne Social Desirability Scale, Short Form 1 (Crowne & Marlowe, 1960; Strahan & Gerbasi, 1972) with 10 items. All the scales were presented in a Likert-type format with five anchor options, ranking from strongly disagree (0) to strongly agree (4). Values of Cronbach’s alpha (internal consistency) of all the measures appear in Table 2. Little’s MCAR test was not significant, χ²(41, 374) = 2090.96, ns; therefore, missing values were replaced using the EM algorithm.

Procedure

The three instruments of the battery were administered both in individual and group sessions. All participants volunteered to participate and anonymity and confidentiality were assured. The time needed to complete the questionnaire was about 45 minutes.

Results

Indigenous Social Desirability Scale

For the ISDS, we ran a confirmatory factor analysis on the complete sample. As our set of 28 items was still considered to be too long for practical purposes, we shortened the instrument once more. The results of the analysis suggest that a shorter version with 14 items adequately represents the two dimensions of positive and negative aspects of SDR obtained from the 28-item version (see Table 1 for an overview of the items and their loadings). The chi-square goodness-of-fit test suggested a poor fit, χ²(75, N = 1,227) = 314.915, p < .001, probably because of the large sample size. However, all other fit statistics pointed to a good fit, root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) = .05, the goodness-of-fit index (GFI) = .96, adjusted goodness-of-fit index (AGFI) = .95, and the Tucker–Lewis index (TLI) = .90. The correlation between the two factors is r = .25. In summary, the results showed that the two-factor model adequately represents the observed data with six positive and eight negative items.

Table 1.

Standardized Loadings in the Confirmatory Factor Analysis.

Item	Negative	Positive
I have received excessive change in a store and said nothing about it.	.45
I would accept a bribe if the benefit I received were considerable.	.63
I would steal if no one caught me at it.	.55
I have spoken ill of my friends without them knowing about it.	.47
I tell lies if I know that I will not be discovered.	.53
When facing certain problems, the most comfortable solution is to bribe whoever is necessary.	.52
I would omit the truth if it were going to damage me.	.40
I have avoided returning something which did not belong to me by faking forgetfulness.	.52
I forget other people’s faults, even if they hurt me very much.		.66
I am willing to aid people in any situation.		.34
I constantly try to make up with my enemies.		.52
I easily forget the offenses committed against me.		.77
I am kind to all people, regardless of their way of being.		.33
I easily forgive those who offend me.		.71

Note. N = 1,227.

Marlowe–Crowne Scale

We conducted an exploratory factor analysis on the Marlowe–Crowne scale with the total sample. Bartlett’s test of sphericity was significant (1575.835, df = 45, p < .001) and the Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin measure of sampling adequacy was appropriate (.744). Based on the scree plot we extracted two factors, as has been done before (Millham, 1974; Ramanaiah & Martin, 1980). The factors, accounting for 26% and 16% of the variance, referred to attribution (involving the endorsement of positive or desirable, yet not very common traits) and denial (the rejection of negative or undesirable, though very common traits). The correlation between the two factors is r = .16.

Psychometric Properties

The descriptive statistics and correlations for all the measures are shown in Table 2. Values of Cronbach’s alpha (internal consistency) of the ISDS were .74 and .71 for the positive and negative dimension, respectively, whereas these values were a bit lower for the attribution and denial Marlowe–Crowne subscales (.53 and .71, respectively).

Table 2.

Correlations Between SDR Scales and Personality Variables Based on the Total Sample.

Total Sample	M	SD	α	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9
1. ISDS-Positive	14.60	4.41	.74	—
2. ISDS-Negative	24.30	4.90	.71	.25**	—
3. MC-SDS-Attribution	12.92	3.33	.53	.23**	.23**	—
4. MC-SDS-Denial	10.91	4.24	.71	.37**	.38**	.16**	—
5. Neuroticism	19.08	6.49	.66	−.21**	−.30**	−.26**	−.35**	—
6. Extraversion	31.77	5.89	.63	.18**	.21**	.25**	−.06*	−.32**	—
7. Openness	27.41	5.91	.53	−.06*	.13**	.12**	−.12**	−.10**	.19**	—
8. Agreeableness	30.58	5.80	.60	.39**	.43**	.28**	.47**	−.30**	.27**	.05	—
9. Conscientiousness	34.17	7.30	.82	.35**	.36**	.32**	.39**	−.41**	.33**	.00	.38**	—

Note. N = 1,227. The Positive and Negative dimensions are part of the Indigenous Social Desirability Scale; Attribution and Denial are part of the Marlowe–Crowne Social Desirability Scale. ISDS = Indigenous Social Desirability Scale; MC-SDS = Marlowe–Crowne Social Desirability Scale; α = reliability (Cronbach’s alpha). The ISDS scores are based on the 14-item version. The negative items of the ISDS and the denial items of the MC-SDS are inversely recoded to qualify for the socially desirable direction.

p < .05. **p < .01.

Validity

The correlation pattern suggests that the scores on ISDS and the Marlowe–Crowne show convergent validity (see Table 2). Both positive and negative dimensions were correlated significantly with the attribution and denial dimensions from the Marlowe–Crowne Scale.

An analysis of variance (ANOVA) was conducted to test group differences (three levels: students, religious persons, and inmates) on the ISDS and the Marlowe–Crowne Social Desirability Scale. Descriptives and results of the ANOVA are presented in Table 3. Post hoc tests showed that the inmate sample had the highest scores and the students the lowest scores on the positive scale of the ISDS; the religious samples showed values in between and did not differ from the other groups. The differences in the negative factor were more pronounced; the lowest scores were obtained by the inmates, followed by the students, followed by the religious people. The attribution scale of the Marlowe–Crowne Scale was lowest for religious persons and highest for inmates; the students did not differ from the two other samples. Finally, denial scores differed significantly across the three groups, with the lowest scores for students and the highest scores for inmates. It can be concluded that students tended to have the lowest scores on the SDR scales and inmates the highest; religious people showed higher scores than students on the denial and negative scales (which both involve negative behaviors), but did not differ on the positive aspects. The profile of high scores of inmates was not found for negative aspects of SDR, where this group scored significantly lower than the other groups.

Table 3.

Mean, Standard Deviations, and Analysis of Variance for the Effects of Group on the Two Social Desirability Measures.

	Students		Religious Persons		Inmates
Scale	M	SD	M	SD	M	SD	F ^a	p	η²
Indigenous Social Desirability Scale
Positive	12.96_a	4.07	15.90_{a, b}	4.70	16.17_b	3.94	87.72	.001	.12
Negative	24.24_a	4.69	26.56_b	4.62	23.45_c	5.02	28.44	.001	.04
Marlowe–Crowne Social Desirability Scale
Attribution	13.02_a,b	3.02	12.37_a	3.17	13.04_b	3.75	3.04	.048	.01
Denial	8.88_a	3.57	11.32_b	4.04	13.35_c	3.78	174.89	.001	.23

Note. Means with different subscripts are significantly different (post hoc test, Bonferroni adjusted).

df = 2, 1134.

Regression Analysis

We ran hierarchical multiple regression analyses on both SDR scales (see Table 4) using personality factors as predictors of SDR. In the first step, we entered group membership as we wanted to control for the significant differences obtained in the ANOVA. The next step introduced age, sex, and level of education as control variables to ensure that the associations between personality and SDR would not be confounded by these variables. Results showed that the introduction of personality variables increased the proportion of variance significantly in all analyses (on average with 24%). Agreeableness and conscientiousness were positive predictors of all scales, where neuroticism was a negative predictor of all scales except for positive aspects of the ISDS. Openness was a weaker and positive predictor, which was only significant for the negative subscale of the ISDS and attribution scale of the Marlowe–Crowne. Interestingly, extraversion was a significant, positive predictor of the positive scale of the ISDS and the attribution scale of the Marlowe–Crowne Scale and a negative predictor of the other scales. This pattern suggests that extraversion is positively related to positive aspects of SDR, such as confirming a positive impression of oneself, and negatively related to negative aspects, such as avoiding bad impressions.

Table 4.

Hierarchical Multiple Regression Analyses Predicting Social Desirable Responding From Background and Personality Variables.

	ISDS				MC-SDS
	Positive		Negative		Attribution		Denial
Predictor	ΔR²	β	ΔR²	β	ΔR²	β	ΔR²	β
Step 1
Group	.13**		.04**		.00		.23**
Religious affiliation		.18**		.11**		−.08*		.12**
Inmates		.12*		−.14*		−.04		.30**
Step 2
Control variables	.00		.02**		.01		.01*
Age		.05		−.04		.02		.05
Sex		−.11**		.09**		−.02		−.04
Level of education		−.10*		.03		.02		.01*
Step 3
Personality	.17**		.26**		.16**		.24**
Neuroticism		−.01		−.15**		−.07*		−.23**
Extraversion		.16**		−.05		.10**		−.21**
Openness		−.03		.07**		.06*		−.04
Agreeableness		.25**		.29**		.16**		.36**
Conscientiousness		.14**		.25**		.21**		.14**
Total R²	.30		.32		.17		.48
N	1,217		1,217		1,217		1,217

Note. ISDS = Indigenous Social Desirability Scale; MC-SDS = Marlowe–Crowne Social Desirability Scale. The negative items of the ISDS and the denial items of the MC-SDS are inversely recoded to qualify for the socially desirable direction.

p < .05. **p < .01.

Discussion

A confirmatory factor analysis provided evidence for the presence of two factors in the ISDS, involving positive and negative aspects of SDR, in line with findings on the Marlowe–Crowne Scale (Ramanaiah & Martin, 1980) and the BIDR (Paulhus, 1984). These two dimensions are not highly correlated, which suggests that separate scale scores are easier to interpret than an SDR total score.

The correlations between the scales of the Marlowe–Crowne and the ISDS scales were significant though not very strong (approximately .30), suggesting not only that there is common variance between them but also that the scales are sufficiently different to consider them as measures that cannot be exchanged. According to our reliability analysis, scores on the ISDS scales showed a higher internal consistency than the Marlowe–Crowne scales; low reliabilities of scores on the shortened version of the Marlowe–Crowne have been reported before (Ballard, 1992; Loo & Thorpe, 2000). The ISDS has four items more than the Marlowe–Crowne Scale; however, this difference is not sufficient to count for the disparity in reliability, suggesting that the content is what makes the ISDS more suitable in a Mexican context.

The religious group scored differently on both SDR scales when compared with the inmate and students samples, notably on the negative and denial scales, which is in accordance with the literature (Crandall & Gozali, 1969; Ellis & Smith, 1991; Leak & Fish, 1989), suggesting that items can trigger more SDR when they are related to religious values. The inmate population also showed a higher SDR pattern than the other two groups, which is in line with previous studies (Fisher & Parsons, 1962; Slaton et al., 2000; Stuckless et al., 1995). However, there is not a straightforward interpretation; on one hand, it can be assumed that prisoners have the ability to give a favorable image of themselves to impress the audience. On the other hand, the context can trigger SDR. As the inmates can be subject to evaluation to reduce their sentence for good behavior, this condition itself can elevate SDR scores (similar to high scores among job applicants). So, it is not clear if the high scores are because of individual differences that already existed prior to imprisonment or are because of the condition of imprisonment.

General Discussion

Some findings on cross-cultural differences of SDR (e.g., Dudley et al., 2005; Hough, 1998) could be partly or entirely due to nonequivalence of items or other challenges of cross-cultural comparability, such as educational differences (van de Vijver & Leung, 2000). The two most important scales of SDR, the Marlowe–Crowne Scale and the BIDR, were developed in Western countries; however, the value domain that represents desirable and undesirable behaviors is somewhat different in the Latin American context. In order to overcome these problems of cultural fit of Western measures, a new scale of SDR was conceived and developed to capture the desirability of typical characteristics among the Mexican population. We described its development, using a mixed-methods approach in which a qualitative study was conducted to obtain information about locally relevant indicators of desirable and undesirable behavior, followed by a quantitative study to evaluate the psychometric properties of the new instrument. The use of the emic–etic approach (Cheung et al., 2011) in the development of the ISDS proved fruitful, as we generated both items with contents that were similar to items in existing scales of SDR, as well as more culture-specific items, referring to content that is particularly prominent among Mexicans. Examples of the latter are items about respect, forgiveness, kindness, and loyalty. The indigenous development allowed us to formulate these items in a way that is culturally salient for Mexicans.

The ISDS, our indigenous scale of SDR, yielded two factors, comprising positive and negative characteristics. The reliability of scores on the ISDS is superior to those of a shortened version of the Marlowe–Crowne Scale and its factorial solution, distinguishing between a positive and negative component, is clearer. The ISDS factors avoid the ambiguous and sometimes complex interpretation of not well-validated orientations, notably a self-deceptive orientation.

The scales showed similar nomological networks in terms of correlations with personality measures, suggesting that both measures have common variance; however, the correlations of the two scales are modest, which implies that the ISDS and Marlow–Crowne Scale cannot be used interchangeably. The results also established that the ISDS shows a predictable pattern of score differences across groups with specific SDR tendencies, which supports the content and construct validity of the scale. For future studies on the ISDS, it may also be useful to gather more information about its stability, and its use with other Latin American countries to compare with Western countries in order to test hypotheses on cultural differences, and to get more insight in universal and culture-specific aspects of SDR. It is also suggested to examine its concurrent validity using the BIDR and other measures of SDR to check for finer psychometric and predictive qualities. Our study demonstrated that if Western measures of social desirability are exported to a non-Western context, validity of their scores in the new cultural context cannot be taken for granted and has to be shown. Moreover, our study demonstrated that such Western measures may neither be completely adequate nor completely inadequate. It requires an indigenous approach to demonstrate this. Finally, our study showed that scores on the Marlow–Crowne have some validity in the Mexican context. It may be noted that our approach in which we investigate both an indigenous and an imported, Western measure at the same time is superior to the frequently used approach in which only data on the Western instrument are available.

Implication for Practitioners

Counselors should carefully choose their instruments, as the measures should guarantee a fair evaluation in any particular situation to any particular group, excluding any possibility of voluntary or involuntary prejudice. SDR measures can play an important role in this assessment, as they may provide information of personality or social adjustment (e.g., McCrae & Costa, 1983; Uziel, 2010), also in an acculturation context. U.S. counselors usually work with culturally diverse populations, such as migrants from Latin America, and Mexicans more frequently than any other minority group. The quality of service delivery of counselors will benefit from having a culture-informed inventory of SDR for the Mexican population in Mexico and abroad available so that clients will not see test content that is unfamiliar or inadequate to them. Additionally, an SDR test can be useful to give additional indirect information about the emotional state of a client, such as the level of distress a person can experience when taking a self-report measure (Smith, Robinson, & Young, 2007).

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the following collaborators in alphabetic order, for their support in collecting data and process preliminary analyses: Rosa María Córdova Álvarez, Rodrigo Antonio Galán Mendoza, José María Jiménez Orvañanos, Miguel Ángel Méndez García, María Emilia Orozco del Pino and María Teresa Pinelo Nava. We also want to thank Oscar Flores and Aida Cortés Flores for their support in facilitating the procedure for collecting the inmate population data.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: The first author received financial support from the National Council of Science and Technology of Mexico, grant number CB-2008 -82988.

Author Biographies

Alejandra del Carmen Domínguez Espinosa obtained her PhD in social psychology from the National Autonomous University of Mexico with honorable mention in 2003. She holds a full-time researcher position at the Iberoamerican University since 2004. Her research involves response styles, acculturation, and indigenous psychology measurement.

Fons J. R. van de Vijver holds a PhD from Tilburg University. He holds a chair in cross-cultural psychology at Tilburg University. He has published more than 350 publications, mainly in the domain of cross-cultural psychology. His research involves bias and equivalence, psychological acculturation and multiculturalism, cognitive similarities, response styles, translations, and adaptations.

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